A number of my cousins in Harlowe also "hauled cabbage" back in the 1930s and '40s. One of them was my mother's first cousin Edsel, who often told me tales of his adventures driving all night to deliver truckloads of cabbage to New York City's Washington Square Market by dawn.
Harlowe N.C.
In My Great-Uncle’s Sweet Potato Fields, 1942
This group of photographs is more personal for me than most of the other historical photographs that I have featured here: they were taken at my great-uncle George Ball and his brother Raymond Ball's potato farm in Harlowe, N.C. (Part 11 of my "Working Lives" series.)
A Place Called Oyster Creek
Many years ago, there used to be a little settlement called Oyster Creek down on the north side of the Newport River, not far from my family’s homeplace. My grandmother’s neighbor Beatrice Mason— we called her “Miss Beadie”—told me about it long ago.
Why I Love Wonder Bread
One look at an old photograph and suddenly I was three years old again and standing on the side of Hwy. 101, near the turn to Mrs. Kay Wright's farm, and I was stepping up into a Wonder Bread delivery truck.
My Grandmother’s Fruitcake
I came to making fruitcakes late in life. One fall morning, maybe 15 or 20 years ago, I woke up craving a slice of my grandmother Vera’s fruitcake. My grandmother, Vera Sabiston Bell, lived in an old farmhouse in a little community called Harlowe in Carteret County, N.C.
A Family Story from WWI
All these years later, Ed Pond and I are friends, brought together by a mutual interest in Down East's history and by an act of kindness a century ago on the battlefields of France.
The Wild Plums at Core Creek– or, In Praise of Slow Cooking
I wrote this piece 22 years ago when my children were little. It seems a little dated today in some ways, but not in the most important ways, and I thought it might make a nice gift for today-- reading it now certainly reminds me of how much I have to be thankful for. Happy Thanksgiving!
Ricky Moore’s Saltbox Seafood Joint Cookbook
Chef Ricky Moore's new cookbook is out and I think he's written the finest seafood cookbook you’ve ever seen and probably ever will see if you’re like me and love the flavors of the North Carolina coast.
The Quaker Map: From Harlowe to Mill Creek
I recently found this map in an old book called The Williams History: Tracing the Descendants in America of Robert Williams, of Ruthin, North Wales, who Settled in Carteret County, North Carolina, in 1763. The map describes a largely forgotten group of Quaker settlements that flourished on the North Carolina coast more than 200 years ago.
A Chef’s Life
Tonight my daughter Vera and I are making a guest appearance on Vivian Howard’s Emmy-winning TV show “A Chef’s Life”....
The Harlowe Patriots
Here is a sentence that I thought I'd never write: one of the highlights of my year was my induction into the Sons of the American Revolution.
David Cecelski 